Peg Kerr's Journal

I have been thinking this week about isolation.

After several weeks of nagging, I convinced my friend Eleanor to go see a movie with me, Coyote vs. ACME (which is very good, and you should definitely see it). Eleanor, who is in her eighties, lives with her partner Patrick and has been mentioning that she has not been getting out at all. I used to meet her every week for coffee along with a couple of other friends, lydamorehouse and naomikritzer. But we switched to Zoom during the pandemic, and somehow, when the pandemic ended, we never switched back to in-person meetings. It's partly because it's a hassle for Eleanor to get to the coffee shop we met at every week, because she doesn't drive, and partly--I dunno. We just never started again. So going to a movie with her felt like a surprisingly big deal.

I have been thinking about that all week. Going out to a movie with someone is a big deal.

Meeting someone for coffee or dinner or a visit to the theater or a restaurant is a big deal.

Perhaps I have been thinking about it lately because Eleanor has been fretting about her isolation a bit. Perhaps it's that memories of the pandemic are coming back because I just recently had my vaccine shot and people are masking more in public.

I live alone. As I've said before, I'm not meant to live alone. But I think that, since the pandemic, social isolation for me--for everyone--has gotten worse, and society has never quite switched back.

I remember a Steve Sack cartoon that came when America shut down that has haunted me ever since: everyone stuck alone on their own little islands. I'm a widow, and it seemed even worse for me. Everyone in my family was isolating WITH someone. Even my mother, who is also a widow, lived in a community where she could see people, where someone checked in with her every day.

I ran across this article this week, "You are no longer invited for dinner," which really drove the point home. The share of people who have invited people over to their home has declined 70% since 1975. That is an absolutely astounding number.

My Year of Adventure was an attempt to battle this. But I am still bothered by my isolation. Even doing my Year of Adventure, I never invited anyone over to my home for dinner. Not once. What's wrong with me? (My daughters just don't like eating with me for complicated reasons, and I've accepted that. But still.)

I live alone. I don't like it. I am not depressed about it, exactly.

But I am feeling it and thinking about it more than usual this week.

Image description: A woman stands alone on a rock in the sea, her back partially turned away from the viewer, her hand over her eyes, scanning the horizon.

Isolation



Click on the links to see the 2026, 2025, 2024, 2023, 2022 and 2021 52 Card Project galleries.

I started studying Spanish on Duolingo at the end of August 2024. I have studied every single day since then. Nope, I haven’t missed a single day of practice, usually practicing two times a day, for a total of about twenty minutes to an hour a day.

I’m really glad for my time with Spanish, PARTICULARLY with how helpful it proved to be with Metro Surge. I can read signs in Spanish when I’m out and about. I have reached CEFR B1 level, which means I am supposedly fluent enough to be able to get the gist if I watch a television show in Spanish.
I always said I would give it two years and then move on to the next language. I have decided to move on to German. I have enough languages under my belt now that I think I can do some switching around, as I want to retain my fluency. So the tentative plan at this point is German M-F and then perhaps French on Saturday and Spanish on Sunday.

My streak on Duolingo is 1188 days (about 3.25 years of language practice, every single day). Is it a perfect system? Am I fluent? No and no. But I went from knowing no Spanish whatsoever to where I am today, and I’m genuinely proud of the accomplishment.

Compare my earlier collages for French and Spanish. Somehow, I never did one for Scottish Gaelic.

Image description: Background: German flag. Top: the word 'Duolingo.' Left center: Duolingo owl in German lederhosen. Lower left: cartoon beer and wurtz. Lower right corner: a picture of Peg, smiling, with a cartoon Tyrolean German hat.

German



Click on the links to see the 2026, 2025, 2024, 2023, 2022 and 2021 52 Card Project galleries.

I sort of blew it this week. This isn't a problem I have very often (my daughters alternately tease me and get annoyed at my tendency to pull out my iPhone camera on every possible occasion). But this week, at the event that clearly would be the centerpiece of my weekly collage, I failed to pull out my camera a single time. And therefore, I had to assemble this collage from components that captured the feeling of the moment, but were not taken AT the moment.

It feels like cheating.

This week we celebrated the 90th birthday of my mother-in-law Mel. I have always adored Mel, who is wise, kind, and true, and I have been so very grateful that after the loss of Rob, I am still considered an integral part of his family. I know that this isn't true for all widows. Rob and I always considered the fact that we truly loved each other's families to be one of the cornerstone strengths of our marriage.

Rob's brother Lance hosted the celebration in his backyard, and included a delicious catered taco dinner. His sister Erika came from Seattle, his sister Shannon came from Phoenix, Arizona, Mel came from California, and his brother Phil came from LaCrosse, Wisconsin. It felt wonderful to have everyone there, as well as spouses, nieces, and nephews, along with particular friends. As I said, I was so busy with conversations that I didn't pull out my camera once.

The picture of Mel and her surviving children was taken last summer, the day after one of my nieces' wedding.

Bottom: A mother, seated to the left, with her four children seated in a row arrayed in stools next to her. center: background: a catering array of taco fixings. Overlaid over that: a birthday cake and an assembled taco. Top: a backyard catering tent on a lawn with people seated at tables underneath. Overlaid: gold numeral balloons saying '90.'

Image description: Bottom: A mother, seated to the left, with her four children seated in a row arrayed in stools next to her. center: background: a catering array of taco fixings. Overlaid over that: a birthday cake and an assembled taco. Top: a backyard catering tent on a lawn with people seated at tables underneath. Overlaid: gold numeral balloons saying '90.'

Ninety



Click on the links to see the 2026, 2025, 2024, 2023, 2022 and 2021 52 Card Project galleries.

I am not troubled by boredom very often. Part of the reason is that I can be pretty satisfied with a book at any time.

For some reason, that has been working a little less well lately.

It seems exceedingly strange to experience cabin fever in the summer, but that's what I've been feeling. In the past week, I have found myself repeatedly pacing around my living room, muttering under my breath, I gotta get out of here.

Part of the difficulty, I think, is that I want to be out on my porch when I'm reading, but the air quality has been keeping me inside more than I would like.

This collage is going out late this week--again. Last week, the difficulty was technical. This week my difficulty was conception, and I floundered a lot as a result. How do you convey restlessness visually? I usually do these collages while I am Zoom chatting with several of my friends on Fridays every week, and I do often ask them for suggestions, advice, and reactions as I work on each collage. naomikritzer suggested a tiger in a cage could help get the idea across. I chose a choppy sea as the background.

Image description: Background: choppy restless sea. A tiger behind a fence paces forward. Top: the word "Restless"

Restless



Click on the links to see the 2026, 2025, 2024, 2023, 2022 and 2021 52 Card Project galleries.

Although it hasn't really troubled me for a number of years, I spent a good part of my life dealing with depression, a condition that sapped my energy and life satisfaction. Happiness, conversely, seemed like a mirage on the horizon, something that of course I wanted but I assumed for much of my life I would never quite have.

But there were moments, and they were all the sweeter because they seemed so ephemeral. I remember vividly a moment when I was living in Cambridge, England, and studying at the University there. It was a typical cloudy, misty, English day, one that I think of as 'Earl Grey' weather. I was bicycling to a lecture on a quiet Cambridge street, and it suddenly occurred to me that I was, at that moment, perfectly happy. This seemed so unusual to me, that I immediately decided to fix the moment in my mind.

Hang on to this memory. You absolutely must remember this moment as a point in your life that you were perfectly happy.

I had another moment like that this past week. I had done my morning walk with friends, as I do several times a week, and I realized, as I discussed with my physical therapist in an appointment later in the day, that for once I was not experiencing any pain in my hip and back. This was almost a startling realization, as I've been dealing with this pain since last autumn, but for once, it was gone. My mom's wound, which I have been dressing every week, has been healing. I had seen both my girls recently, and they were both doing well. I sat on my porch the next morning, finishing a delicious breakfast of egg custard over chocolate bread with blueberries. I have brought all my plants out to the porch for the summer, and the space is like a welcoming oasis. The weather was perfect, not too hot or humid, and the breeze stirred strands of my hair against my neck.

And I thought to myself, again, with pleasure and deep satisfaction: I am happy.

Image description: Bottom 2/3: a view into an arched courtyard of a college in Cambridge, England. A woman rides a bicycle past the entrance. Left lower corner: a woman's hand wearing a bracelet with the words "Happy." Upper third: a woman on a rock looks up a night star-filled sky. Right side: a sunflower blossom (a symbol of happiness in the language of flowers).

Happiness



Click on the links to see the 2026, 2025, 2024, 2023, 2022 and 2021 52 Card Project galleries.

Last weekend, I was at the Crowne Plaza in Plymouth as one of the Guests of Honor for the Diversicon 33 Convention. The weekend went very well (and I was quite relieved to be in a comfortable hotel during a hot and steamy weekend rather than in my home, which lacks central air).

Adam Stemple was the other Guest of Honor, and there were also two posthumous guests of honor: Homer and Hugo Gernsback. I have known Adam for a number of years and have been on panels with him before. Although we write very different types of fiction (he has been particularly specializing in Grimdark stories, shading into horror), we have always done well on panels together, and this weekend was no exception. There was a panel on story structure, and another on writer's block and mental illness. There were no awkward pauses, and the conversation was lively, with thoughtful questions from the audience. I had an hour-long reading, and people seemed to enjoy the section I read.

I brought several of Rob's autographed books to offer for the auction, and they helped to raise funds that will go back into the convention's costs. (Rob probably would have objected to making the sale at all (!), but at least I think he would have appreciated the beneficiary of the sale.)

I had great conversations and meals together with friends.

Altogether, it was a fun and welcome experience. One more thing has been checked off my bucket list: being the Guest of Honor at a convention.

Image description: Semi-transparent background: Flyer for Diversicon 33, with a headshot picture of Peg, and covers for The Wild Swan and Emerald House Rising. Bottom center: Adam Stemple and Peg Kerr sit at a table. Centered between the two of them, behind: Peg holds up a Diversicon t-shirt up to herself. Right: A Trojan horse figurine. Behind and slightly to the left: an auctioneer holds up a book by Clifford Simak. Upper left: Peg, smiling, wearing a book pin and book earrings. Upper right text: "D33 Guests of Honor: Peg Kerr, Adam Stemple. Posthumous Guests: Homer (8th Century BCE), Hugo Gernsback (1884-1967).

Diversicon



Click on the links to see the 2026, 2025, 2024, 2023, 2022 and 2021 52 Card Project galleries.

I think I did my collage about Heat too early. Several events this week have coalesced together into the thoughts that led to the creation of this week's collage.

The heat this past week was even worse, especially given the accompanying humidity. What made it seem even more wearing was that it just kept going on, day after day. And on Wednesday, smoke from fires in the Boundary Waters rolled in, and we shattered statewide records for polluted air quality.

I pulled out my arsenal of tricks to deal with everything. I stocked the freezer with frozen grapes and wet washcloths. I ran the portable air conditioners, the fan, and the HEPA air filter. I took extra showers. I retreated to air-conditioned coffee shops and went out to visit my mom.

Ants have invaded my kitchen. Since they decided to march across my kitchen counter, I didn't want to use poison and so spread diatomaceous powder up against the cracks and sprayed the surfaces with mint water. Occasionally, I would find one that had fought its way through the powder and continued blundering on in its mysterious path.

I had longstanding plans to get together with my friend, Eleanor Arnason, to travel to see a bird sanctuary in Wisconsin. The heat put paid to that idea, and so we decided to go instead to see an exhibit at the Minneapolis Area Institute of Art that is about to close on July 19: Modern Art and Politics in Germany 1910–1945: Masterworks from the Neue Nationalgalerie, Berlin. I had seen this exhibit before, with Eric, but I was very willing to go again, and the collection affected me even more powerfully than last time.

I definitely felt echoes in today's political events, and in living through Metro Surge.

Eleanor and I both found the exhibit completely absorbing. We finished out the day at FIKA cafe at the American Swedish Institute, where I ordered cardamom coffee and bread pudding, and we declared our outing a complete success.

From the Educator's Guide:

In the first half of the 20th century, Germany experienced the final years of the German Empire, World War I and a subsequent revolution, the liberal Weimar Republic, the rise of National Socialism (Nazism)* under Adolf Hitler, the Holocaust, and World War II. Politics and social change deeply influenced the art of this time. Yet modern art in Germany didn’t simply reflect the changing times. It played an active, influential role in shaping conversations and ideas about those changes.

“Modern Art and Politics in Germany 1910–1945: Masterworks from the Neue Nationalgalerie, Berlin” features more than 70 paintings and sculptures created during these turbulent decades. The Nationalgalerie made history in the 1920s when its director Ludwig Justi founded a so-called Gallery of the Living, one of the first museums of contemporary art in the world. In 1937, more than 500 artworks from this gallery were confiscated as part of the Nazi campaign against art they labeled “degenerate.” Today, the collection of 20th-century art from East and West Germany is housed at the Neue Nationalgalerie, and contemporary art is located in the Hamburger Bahnhof, both in Berlin.

The exhibition traces the visual arts in Germany over four decades. It begins with the rise of Expressionism as a reaction and opposition to the conservative artistic trends during the reign of Kaiser Wilhelm II. The exhibition then explores the Neue Sachlichkeit (New Objectivity) movement, the modern realist style of the 1920s.

And it considers the years between the world wars, when many German artists were influenced by international trends, especially abstraction. Many of the artists who openly critiqued society were silenced under the Nazi dictatorship, from 1933 to 1945. The Nazis insisted that art be consistent with their ideology of racial purity, traditional gender roles, extreme nationalism, and loyalty to Hitler. They classified many works of art as “degenerate,” “Jewish,” or “un-German.” They confiscated artworks from German museums and showcased this art in a “Degenerate Art” exhibition in Munich, Berlin, and other cities, in part to ridicule the artists.

At this exhibit, I learned about how the Nazis, very early, turned their attention to art, declaring certain strains of artistic expression acceptable and admirable, and fiercely prosecuting anyone who dared create alternatives. Apparently, for fascism to flourish, critical voices must be destroyed at the root. It was sobering to read the plaques on the wall and learn how many of the sitters, artists, and art dealers came to dreadful ends: imprisoned, financial ruin, death by their own hand, or in the concentration camps, or at the war front.

I have been thinking about endurance.

I have done my best to hang on through this past week, through the personal discomfort. I watched the ants, going about their business, doggedly maneuvering around obstacles, and I thought about the people whose stories were told in the exhibit. They, too, toiled and struggled and did their best to make their way despite impossible odds.

There were two pieces of work in the exhibit that I found particularly haunting, and I have included them in this week's collage. Wilhelm Lehmbruck’s monumental sculpture Fallen Man, created in 1915–16, depicts an elongated, thin person on its knees and elbows, with its head hanging down. Over time, due to its lack of detail and specific narrative, the work came to be recognized as a quiet but powerful message for peace.

Lehmbruck had originally intended the sculpture to be a heroic monument to military valor and titled it Dying Warrior, completing it before beginning his service as a medic in a military hospital in early 1916. Now one of the most famous sculptures of the period, it is universally interpreted as a memorial against war and a meditation on death as part of a broader cycle of destruction and resurrection.

Eventually, deeply affected by his firsthand experience of the war, Lehmbruck took his own life in March 1916.

Years after his death, in 1937, the Nazi government removed many of Lehmbruck’s works from German museums, labeling them “degenerate art.” Fallen Man would go on to become one of the most iconic sculptures associated with World War I.

The other was George Grosz's painting "Remembering." George Grosz (1893–1959) was a prominent member of the New Objectivity art movement. During the Weimar Republic, his artwork served as a sharp critique of the political and social climate of the time. As the Nazi regime rose to power, Grosz emigrated to the United States to escape fascist persecution.

In 1935, he returned briefly to Germany, just before the outbreak of World War II. During this visit, he witnessed firsthand the brutal oppression of the Nazi regime—a haunting experience that deeply affected him. Upon returning to the United States, he created a painting titled Remembering. In this work, Grosz presented a self-portrait: He crouches shivering amid the ruins of a devastated building, while ghostly visions from his premonitions loom behind him.

Years later, Grosz reflected on the emotional drive behind these images:

I could not explain exactly what was really troubling me. But after I had returned to the States, my paintings became prophetic. I was compelled by an inner warning to paint destruction and ruins; some of my paintings I called “Apocalyptic Landscapes,” though that was quite some time before the real thing took place.

Image description: background: a map of the twin cities, color coded to reflect dangerously high levels of the Air Quality Index (AQI). Upper left: text reads "Modern Art and Politics in Germany 1910-1946. Bottom: a statue of an elongated, thin person on its knees and elbows, with its head hanging down. Above it center left an ant. Right: a decadent iced coffee and cardamom bread pudding in caramel sauce. Behind them: figure from a painting, sitting hunched over and staring bleakly into space.

I like the way the ant faintly mimics the posture of "Fallen Man." And the way that the garish colors of the background are subtly echoed in the tints on George Grosz's face.

[Compare my collage from 2023 Fortitude (which is about a period when I was dealing with similar issues of heat and smoke).]

Endurance



Click on the links to see the 2026, 2025, 2024, 2023, 2022 and 2021 52 Card Project galleries.

This is late and brief because I was at Convergence.

The beautiful weather that we have enjoyed for weeks abruptly dissolved into humid heat at the end of this past week.

Simultaneously and somewhat inexplicably, I experienced a surge of...hmm. How to put this delicately. Let us call it a surge of internal heat.

I know that periods of heightened libido are completely normal, even considering my age.

Still. For a widow living alone, times like these can be a little sad. And frustrating.

And inconvenient.

Image description: A wooden thermometer silhouetted against a hot summer sky. Over the sun a pair of women's lips are half open in passion. At the base of the thermometer, a passion flower is overlaid over a red rose.

Heat



Click on the links to see the 2026, 2025, 2024, 2023, 2022 and 2021 52 Card Project galleries.

As I mentioned in my last post, my granddaughter M's first birthday was this past week. Fiona and Alona decided to combine the celebration for Alona's Master's degree and the change in Fiona's career, along with M's birthday, into one big party.

We were incredibly lucky on the weather: after several weeks of miserable humid heat with poor air quality, the day dawned with comfortable air temperatures and beautiful clarity. The view over the lake was gorgeous. A large circle of friends and family had been invited out to my sister Betsy's beautiful home in Mound on Lake Minnetonka, and 75 people RSVP'd yes.

We had a truly lovely afternoon. There were a number of children, and they enjoyed themselves romping in the sun, playing lawn games, and dancing through the bubbles thrown off by the bubble machine. We had Middle Eastern food catered in as well as nibblies and desserts. Betsy had set tables out on the lawn, and I was included in many lively conversations. It was great to catch up with everyone. M has several great-grandparents, and they all gathered in Adirondack chairs on the lawn overlooking the lake to visit and pass babies around.

M had her own smash cake to taste and destroy, a definite highlight of the event. She was extremely happy all day.

A wonderful day.

M is just on the verge of walking, and whoa, her parents' lives will soon be changing accordingly.

Bottom left corner, Fiona and Delia sit at a table at a party, smiling. Behind them is a table spread with party food. Bottom right corner: a collection of gift bags. Center: white sheet cake with the message "Congratulations on it all!" Above that: Fiona and Alona smile at the camera. Between their heads at the top: a baby's hands smush into a yellow cake.

Celebration



Click on the links to see the 2026, 2025, 2024, 2023, 2022 and 2021 52 Card Project galleries.

Wound care, for me, is love.

In his battle with lymphoma, Rob had a large tumor removed from his scalp--several times, as it tended to grow back. As part of his care, I was taught by the nurses at Mayo Clinic how to dress it several times a week as it healed, which took months.

The first time I did it, I could barely bring myself to go through the motions, afraid of hurting him, of even looking at the area.

But gradually, what at first had been intimidating became bearable and finally routine, just part of the way I cared for him. It was hands-on, part of the way I interacted with the physicality of what he was going through, and yes, part of the way I showed him that I loved him.

In the past couple of years, as my mother has aged, my siblings and I have all stepped up to be more hands-on in assisting her. One of the things I personally do is to help her with her shower once a week. As I was already doing that, and I had experience because of the assistance I gave Rob, I was the natural person to take on the role when her fragile skin on one of her legs developed a tear. Blood flow becomes less robust in elderly skin, so healing can be slow.

It's been three months, and I'm still dressing an area on her calf once a week (the other two times a week she is helped by a visiting nurse who changes the dressing).

In the past week, this took a bit more attention. The change in my schedule due to a medical procedure I was undergoing meant I had to coordinate with the visiting nurses to arrange a change to all three dates that we did the wound care over the course of the week. The nurse and I also consulted with her physician this week: was her ankle swelling a bit too much? What to do about the dry skin? Was the wound stable, or was there an infection?

I don't mind doing wound care. It feels, in fact, like a way I show my mother love. She cared for me as a baby in the most personal way possible. Now each week after I help her with her shower, I rub lotion on her skin and help her dress. And every week, I give her a foot rub before pulling out the latex gloves, the scissors, the cleansing spray, the emulsifying wrap, and the gauze and get to work. The foot massage is not only to increase the blood flow to her feet, but a way to give her my touch, to give her comfort, and to remind her, each and every week, that she is being cared for by those who love her.

Image description: Background: various medical implements used in wound care. Left: a pair of hands wearing latex gloves hold a two-foot length of medical gauze. Behind the medical gauze: a pair of feet of an elderly woman, crossed casually at the ankles. Bottom: the hand of an elderly woman holds a caregiver's hand.

Wound Care



Click on the links to see the 2026, 2025, 2024, 2023, 2022 and 2021 52 Card Project galleries.